The Foundation to Preserve the Memory of Maidan has released its first video with interviews of Euromaidan activists. They all had different roles at Maidan, their experiences vary, but their memories of the revolutionary events are priceless and should be preserved for future generations, researchers, artists.
Initially the Foundation’s goal was to provide a legal basis to a project to collect oral histories of the Maidan events. Stories were collected and interviews held with Maidan fighters and others in order to preserve the memory of what happened to future generations. After realizing that many participants would be wary of telling their story to any State institution, the organizers of the initiative decided that by having an NGO a certain level of safety that would be sufficient for Maidan fighters to share their experiences could be provided. The foundation has an agreement with the Research Center for Eastern Europe (Forschungsstelle Osteuropa) of the University of Bremen in Germany to store copies of the materials. Gradually, however, the project expanded and started focusing on the collection of Maidan artifacts, and in particular on offering a contribution to the development of a memorial and museum at Maidan itself. Unfortunately, a number of people were already killed at the front in Donbas before they were interviewed.
The board of the foundation consists of the following persons:
Chairman:
• Prof. Robert van Voren, Sovietologist, Vilnius (LT)/Hollandsche Rading (NL),
Secretary:
• Dr. Vitalii Nakhmanovich, museologist and historian, Kyiv (UA)
Treasurer:
• Dr. Semyon Gluzman, psychiatrist, Kyiv (UA)
Members of the Board:
• Mridula Gosh, Chairman, East European Development Institute, Kyiv (UA)
• Myroslav Marinovich, deputy rector of the Ukrainian Catholic University, Lviv (UA)
• Dalius Neganavicius, architect, Vilnius (LT)
The Goals of the foundation are:
- To develop, collect and safeguard oral history interviews, both audio- and video-taped and transcribed, with people who were directly or indirectly involved in Maidan, in all its facets, all according to internationally accepted guidelines of the oral history profession;
- To make sure that the oral history collection will be accessible to researchers and others interested, according to the wishes of those interviewed, and that a copy of the archive is safeguarded outside the boundaries of Ukraine as a safety measure;
- To establish partnerships with other initiatives and institutions both within Ukraine and abroad that share our goals and/or wish to support our foundation;
- To collect and safeguard other audio-visual materials that relate to Maidan and that contribute to a full understanding of the events in all its facets and aspects;
- To collect other documents and artifacts that support the stories as told in the oral history collection;
- Where possible to contribute to the collective memory of the national uprising in Ukraine in 2013-2014 in general and the events at Maidan in Kyiv in particular, including the support to monuments and memorials that honor those killed at Maidan and have an educational and informational character;
- To do everything else that is allowed according to Ukrainian legislation and contributes to the implementation of the above-mentioned goals.
The foundation has a facebook page in English and Ukrainian. A site is under construction. You are welcome to contribute your memories and experiences to the archive! Write to maidan_volia (a) ukr.net or call +380 95 595 5070.
